168 INDOOR STUDIES 



No levity, no seeing double, no intellectual as- 

 tigmatism, no make-believe, no spinning of webs, 

 hardly any conscious humor, no o'erripe sentiment, 

 but a steady effort and purpose to see and record 

 the simple fact. It is not more what he has put 

 into his book than what he has kept out of it that 

 has made it keep a hundred years. Carlyle says of 

 a certain celebrated Frenchman, that he was always 

 at the top less by power of swimming than by light- 

 ness in floating. In no disparaging sense is this 

 true of White's "Selborne." It has an inherent 

 principle of buoyancy like a bird. It is a light 

 book in the best sense. It makes no severe de- 

 mand upon the reader's time or attention. It is as 

 easy reading as the letters of a friend. The episto- 

 lary form of the chapters — a form that lends itself 

 so readily, almost inevitably, to directness and sim- 

 plicity of statement — is no doubt one secret of the 

 book's charm. Dullness in private letters is per- 

 haps rarer than dullness in any other species of 

 writing. Plenty of persons write fresh and enter- 

 taining letters who are lead itself in the essay or 

 the sermon. White is less pleasing in his "Obser- 

 vations of Nature " than in his letters. It is a 

 great matter to have a fair and deiinite mark to aim 

 at, and a good reason for obtruding the personal 

 pronoun. White was the type of the true observer. 

 He had the alert, open sense, the genial, hospitable 

 habit of mind, the healthful objectivity and recep- 

 tivity, that at once placed him in right relations 

 ■with outward nature. He had great curiosity and 



